Johnson & Johnson announced that it will stop selling talcum Johnson powder for children in the United States and Canada, and that it made the decision after re-evaluating its products after the emerging Corona virus crisis.
The American company stated that it would stop sales of the product, which accounts for about 0.5% of its trade in the United States in the coming months, but retailers will continue to sell existing stock.
It announced that it will continue to sell corn starch based baby powder in North America, and will sell its talc-based and cornstarch products to other markets around the world.
The decision comes after more than 16,000 lawsuits have been filed against the company from consumers who claim talc products, including Johnson's baby powder, have caused cancer.
The lawsuits confirmed that the company's talc products were contaminated with asbestos, a known carcinogen, while the company replied saying that it was still confident in the safety of the Johnson-dependent talcum powder, citing "decades of scientific studies."
The company had stated that its test had not found asbestos in the baby powder after the tests conducted by the US Food and Drug Administration discovered small quantities, and the US Food and Drug Administration prompted the company to withdraw at once from Johnson's baby powder last October.
"The demand for Johnson's baby powder in North America is declining, due in large part to changes in consumer habits, their belief in misinformation about product safety and a constant barrage of litigation cases," the company said in its statement.
Reuters reported that Johnson and Johnson has known for decades that talc contains asbestos.
The "asbestos disease awareness" organization viewed the decision as a "public health victory," criticizing Johnson & Johnson for being slow to act and misleading clients, while calling on Congress to "ban asbestos once and for all."
"Johnson & Johnson [J&J] has spent decades misleading people into believing that their children's powder contaminated with asbestos is often safe, when they know it is not," said group leader Linda Reinstein.
It is noteworthy that these cases obliged the company to pay billions of dollars in compensation, the last of which was the ruling issued in 2018, to oblige the company to pay $ 4.7 billion in compensation to 22 women, who claimed that these products caused uterine cancer.